


Fearless

by catie_writes_things



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Childhood Friends, Comics What Comics, F/M, Friends to Lovers, Role Reversal, basically we're just swapping mai and ty lee's roles in the story
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-21
Updated: 2021-02-21
Packaged: 2021-03-18 21:20:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,036
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29615580
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/catie_writes_things/pseuds/catie_writes_things
Summary: Ty Lee is afraid of nothing. At least, that's what she tells herself, because as the youngest in a matched set of sisters, timidity will do nothing to help her be seen for who she really is. In reality, there is one thing she is afraid of.But there's also one person who sees her anyway.
Relationships: Azula & Mai & Ty Lee, Ty Lee/Zuko (Avatar)
Comments: 16
Kudos: 67





	Fearless

Among her sisters, Ty Lee was supposed to be the bold one.

There were seven of them - Ty Xiang, Ty Min, Ty Wei, Ty Chu, Ty Sao, Ty Dan, and Ty Lee, the youngest. Seven daughters, born in seven years, and though Ty Lee heard from both her parents and her teachers that daughters were highly prized in the Fire Nation, unlike in the less civilized Earth Kingdom or the barbaric Water Tribes, she also overheard her mother admit, once, to one of her friends, that she had been disappointed when Ty Lee was born. She had wanted at least one son, just for a change of pace. “It’s monotonous, you know,” she had said with a wistful sigh. “Seven of the same.”

And as far as her mother and father were concerned, Ty Lee and her sisters were all the same. They all had the same shade of brown hair, the same round face they’d inherited from their father and the same gray eyes from their mother. Their birthdays all fell in quick succession in the autumn and were often celebrated jointly for convenience. Clothes and toys were handed down from one to the next, or even shared concurrently, so that there was never any clear individual ownership of anything. 

Ty Xiang, the eldest, at least got things when they were new. But Ty Lee on the other end could easily have become the most indistinguishable of them all. That was probably why, from a young age, she had striven to be the loudest, quickest, and most daring of all the girls in the house. It worked, in that she was singled out for scolding by their governess more often than any of her sisters, but it was less successful in that she was seldom scolded by the proper name on the first try.

Funny how the sisters never had any such difficulty amongst themselves.

Ty Xiang was studious, wrote poetry, and watched over her younger sisters with a maternal concern, as was expected of the eldest. Ty Min was shy, fond of reading romances, and usually lost in some daydream. Ty Wei was brilliant at mathematics and had a dry, sarcastic wit, and also the shortest temper in the family. Ty Chu was Ty Wei’s virtual opposite - hopeless at math, indeed at most of her schoolwork, but innocent, charming, and agreeable. Ty Sao was the most musical, playing both the erhu and the flute, and fond of making puns and jokes. Ty Dan preferred the pipa, and also liked gardening and therefore usually had dirt on her sleeves. And Ty Lee, of course, was the boisterous, extroverted acrobat.

They were all so different, and yet no one seemed to be able to tell them apart.

Because of this, Ty Lee had no particular enthusiasm about starting school when she was old enough. All of her older sisters attended the Royal Fire Academy for Girls, after all, so this would be only one more thing they had in common. But the day before she was to start her first term, her mother took her aside -  _ just _ her, which hardly ever happened - and explained that Princess Azula would be in her class at the academy, and it would be a very good thing for their family if Ty Lee could befriend her.

None of her sisters had had that opportunity. And Ty Lee was, after all, the bold one. She was hardly going to pass it up.

* * *

Being friends with Azula turned out not to be everything Ty Lee had expected.

It was good for their family - her parents were frequently invited to the palace now, and had even had an audience with Fire Lord Azulon himself. Ty Min seemed to think this meant they would all end up with wealthy and important husbands, while Ty Wei was more interested in potential advancement for them in the military.

Being known as one of the princess’s two close confidantes at school also gave Ty Lee a certain status - no one wanted to get on the wrong side of a member of the royal family, which meant no one wanted to cross her friends, either. Ty Lee and Mai, the other girl Azula had elected to take into her closest circle of friends, both enjoyed this prestige, which even extended so far as the teachers, who were hesitant to issue strong reprimand for any transgressions the three girls were involved in.

And Azula certainly had no shortage of schemes for transgressions, which could be quite fun - sneaking into the pantry to steal sweets, eavesdropping on the headmistress’s private conversations, climbing up onto the school roof at night. It was all harmless rule-breaking, Ty Lee thought.

If she or Mai ever expressed any doubts, Azula always brushed them aside with the same question: “You’re not  _ scared, _ are you?”

Azula wasn’t scared of anything. Neither was Mai, as far as Ty Lee could tell - at the very least, she did a good job hiding it. And Ty Lee, the boldest of all her sisters, was determined not to be outdone by her friends. She didn’t want to be scared of anything, either.

Except she  _ was _ scared of one thing.

* * *

When Ty Lee was seven years old, Azula managed to convince her mother that her friends should stay with her at the palace between terms. Ty Lee’s parents, of course, readily agreed to this arrangement, as did Mai’s. That was how Ty Lee met Zuko for the first time.

They were in the palace gardens, playing a game that involved sitting absolutely still with their hands held out, and seeing who could be the first to land a slap on another player’s hands. Ty Lee didn’t like this game - she wasn’t good at sitting still, and Azula hit hard - so it was no surprise when she was quickly eliminated and the contest came down to Azula versus Mai. Azula, of course, was determined not to lose, but being utterly impassive until it was time to suddenly spring into action was Mai’s forté, so Ty Lee knew the match could go on for some time. And if the game was no fun for her to play, it was even more boring for her to watch.

Fortunately, Prince Zuko entered the gardens, providing a perfectly-timed distraction. The young prince clearly had little interest in his sister’s friends as he settled down by the turtleduck pond, but Ty Lee didn’t let that stop her. She cartwheeled, tumbled, and then walked on her hands the rest of the way across the gardens, finally flopping down in the grass next to him.

“Hi!” she said brightly, smiling up at him. “I’m Ty Lee.”

“I know who you are,” the older boy replied. Presumably this meant Azula had told him. After a moment of hesitation, he added politely, “I’m Zuko.”

“Can you do a cartwheel?” Ty Lee asked. Azula hadn’t known how, until Ty Lee had taught her - and then she had practiced obsessively until she was just as good at them as Ty Lee was.

“No,” Zuko scoffed, giving her a strange look. It seemed Azula didn’t share everything with him, then - but she  _ had _ shared Ty Lee’s name. Even more impressive, Zuko had remembered it.

“D’you want to learn how?” Ty Lee offered, sitting up and tucking her feet under her, reading to spring up at a moment’s notice and demonstrate for him.

But before Zuko could answer one way or another, Azula’s voice rang out from the other side of the garden. “Ty Lee!” she called, and Ty Lee sprang to her feet anyway at the tone of her friend’s voice. “Leave Zuzu alone with his turtleducks. We’re going down to the stables.”

“Mom told you to stay out of the stables!” Zuko shouted back at his sister with a frown.

But Azula only rolled her eyes at her older brother. “What Mom doesn’t know won’t hurt her,” she replied airily. Then, with a warning look at Ty Lee, who was still standing next to Zuko, she added, “Come  _ on.” _

“Bye, Zuko!” Ty Lee called cheerfully as she ran to follow Azula out of the gardens. She thought he mumbled a goodbye back, but she wasn’t quite sure.

As it turned out, the stables were smellier and less exciting than Ty Lee had expected - that is, there was little excitement until Azula spooked one of the komodo rhinos, which nearly trampled Mai. Ty Lee pulled her friend out of the way at the last second while Azula laughed at them. The stablemaster angrily kicked them out after that, and Azula’s mother did end up finding out about their escapade, for which all three girls were sent to bed early as punishment.

Azula, for some reason, blamed this entirely on her brother.

“You don’t really think he told on us, do you?” Ty Lee whispered in the artificial darkness of the room all three girls were sharing, the curtains drawn shut against the twilight as part of their punishment. It seemed much more likely to her that the stablemaster had been the one to inform Azula’s mother of what they had been up to.

Azula scoffed. “He must have,” she insisted stubbornly. “You can’t count on Zuzu for anything.”

Ty Lee still had her doubts about that, but she knew better than to voice them.

* * *

The following year, Mai and Ty Lee spent their school holiday at the palace again. Ty Lee always made a point to at least smile and wave when she saw Zuko, if not actually say hello to him. At first Zuko would return her greetings, but after a while he started ignoring her. 

“Don’t bother with him,” Azula scolded when Ty Lee’s face fell at this unexpected coldness. “We’ve got better things to do than hang around with my dumdum brother.”

And the three girls did have fun, as always. Azula was learning firebending in earnest now, and though neither Mai or Ty Lee were benders, as noble daughters of the Fire Nation they were still expected to learn to fight as well, and had begun sparring lessons at school that year. Ty Lee enjoyed combining what she had learned with her gymnastics, and practicing with her friends, even if Azula was pretty much impossible to beat. Mai, at least, was more of a fair match.

As the weeks went by, Ty Lee had all but forgotten about Prince Zuko’s inexplicable snub, until one day Azula herself cajoled her mother into making Zuko play with them. Ty Lee knew that Azula had no sincere desire to play with her brother, and had to once again be up to something, but all she could do was wait and see what it was.

That was how she wound up standing by the fountain with an apple on her head.

“So the way this game works,” Azula explained with a grin, “is you try to knock the apple off the other person’s head.” Getting into a bending stance, she met Ty Lee’s nervous gaze with a wicked gleam in her eye. “Hold still,” she admonished.

Azula knew she couldn’t hold still.

But Azula also had very good aim, and the little blast of fire she let loose only grazed the apple - grazed it, and set it on fire. Ty Lee twitched and panicked - and then fell backwards into the fountain, with Zuko on top of her.

“Aawww, Zuzu,” Azula crooned, clasping her hands under her chin in an exaggerated, sentimental gesture. “You  _ do _ care!”

Ty Lee blushed furiously as Zuko scrambled to his feet. “You girls are crazy!” he blustered, storming off, while Mai hid a snigger behind one hand and Azula batted her eyelashes innocently.

“Azula,” Ty Lee whined, her eyes stinging as she climbed out of the fountain herself. Her favorite outfit was now all wet, and Zuko probably thought she had been in on the prank. “That was really…”

She trailed off when she caught the look on her friend’s face, all pretense of innocence gone. “Really what?” Azula challenged.

“Nothing,” Ty Lee mumbled with a pout. Azula’s mom was calling her now anyway, so she shrugged and ran off, leaving Ty Lee to sniffle and look at Mai.

“Oh, lighten up,” Mai said, rolling her eyes. “It was just a joke.”

“ _ Azula’s _ idea of a joke,” Ty Lee muttered, wiping her eyes.

Mai didn’t say anything else. But she at least did go back to their room with Ty Lee and help her hang up her wet clothes to dry.

Later that afternoon, Ty Lee made a point to find Zuko by herself. He was in one of the palace’s many courtyards, where he usually practiced his firebending forms. But today he wasn’t bending, but pretending to fight with a knife instead. Ty Lee had never seen Zuko fight with a weapon before, and didn’t step out of the shadows of the colonnade at first, just watching. But when he paused, she took a deep breath and steeled herself for why she had come.

“Hey, Zuko!” she called out cheerfully, stepping out into the sunlit courtyard.

Zuko turned and glared at her. “What do you want now?” he asked, slipping the pearl blade of the knife back into its sheath.

“I just wanted to tell you I’m sorry about what Azula did earlier,” Ty Lee went on, undaunted. “And to say thanks, for you know, trying to get the flaming apple off my head.” She shrugged as she said this last part, trying to make it as friendly and casual as possible.

Zuko’s expression softened to one of surprise. “Oh,” he said. “Azula never apologizes for anything.”

She never thanked him, either, Ty Lee would bet. “Well, I’m not Azula, obviously,” she replied, smiling.

Zuko rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly, his eyes downcast. “Yeah, I guess you’re not.” He fiddled with the sheathed knife in his hand for a moment before speaking again. “Hey, listen, I guess I should say sorry too for ignoring you and all.” He looked up at her through his lashes, embarrassed. “Azula told me you were just being nice to make fun of me, but I guess I should know better than to listen to her.”

Ty Lee laughed at this explanation. “Yeah, really,” she agreed. “Azula’s such a good liar…” 

It was a skill that had kept her and her friends out of a lot of trouble at school, but Ty Lee was beginning to see how being friends with someone so deceptive could have its drawbacks as well.

* * *

Fire Lord Azulon died later that year, and Azula’s father unexpectedly became the new Fire Lord. Ty Lee did not get to attend the coronation - it was not an event for children, except for royal children like Zuko and Azula - but her parents did. They, along with Mai’s parents, were also among the select few invited to a more private reception with Fire Lord Ozai that evening. 

“There are certainly advantages,” Ty Lee’s mother proclaimed at the family breakfast table the following day, “to having a daughter who is a close confidante of the second in line for the throne.”

Ty Lee’s father only hummed and nodded at this bold statement, and Ty Lee herself rolled her eyes, earning her a cautionary look from Ty Xiang. But Ty Wei smirked. “I heard she’s gotten pretty close with the new crown prince, too,” she said pointedly.

Ty Min sighed dreamily. “Of course the youngest will make the best marriage of all!” she said with a faraway look in her eyes, which made all the other girls giggle while Ty Lee blushed.

“Now, Ty Chu, that’s not for us to say,” their mother scolded.

“I’m Ty Chu,” said Ty Chu pleasantly from the opposite side of the table as Ty Min.

“Of course, dear,” their mother replied. “I meant Ty Min. But regardless, Fire Lord Ozai will decide whom Prince Zuko is to marry someday, and it’s not for us to speculate.” Still, with a smile at her youngest daughter, she added, “Though we’d all be very honored if he did choose Ty Lee.”

To cover her own embarrassment at this conversation, Ty Lee made a face, which had all her sisters laughing again. “She’ll have to have better manners than that, if she wants to be Fire Lady someday,” Ty Sao scolded playfully. 

And then, thankfully, Ty Xiang asked Ty Dan about the new herb garden she was planting, and the subject of future marriages was left behind.

But Ty Sao’s words stuck in her head, and from then on would come back to her at odd moments. Ty Lee had no particular interest in marrying Zuko or anyone else, but this was the first time anyone had suggested that she might have a shot at becoming the Fire Lady, and  _ that _ idea did captivate her, in its own way.

After all, there was only  _ one _ Fire Lady, and everyone would know exactly who she was.

* * *

The other thing that happened when Fire Lord Azulon died and Fire Lord Ozai came to the throne was that Azula’s mom disappeared. There was never an official explanation given for this, and Azula never wanted to talk about it, so Ty Lee had no idea what had become of her. All she knew was that Zuko got quieter, and started spending more time with his uncle once he returned from Ba Sing Se, and Azula got…

Well, the only word for it was  _ meaner. _

She said nasty things at school, not only to their classmates but even to their teachers, with all the impunity that the Fire Lord’s daughter enjoyed. Her childish pranks got more daring and more dangerous. And even being her friend wasn’t enough to count oneself totally safe.

Azula loved to make biting remarks to Mai about her looks, her clothes, her grades - things that would have driven any other girl to hysterics. But Mai only grew more impassive as the years went on, refusing to react to any of Azula’s provocations. Ty Lee envied her sometimes - a harsh word from Azula was enough to make her own eyes water, much to her frustration. But the silver lining in this was that Azula didn’t get any fun out of making her cry. It was too easy.

Still, Ty Lee considered Azula her friend. After all, she kept inviting her and Mai to stay at the palace during every school break, gave them lavish birthday presents, and never once called Ty Lee by one of her sisters’ names, which was more than most of their teachers and classmates could say. She was also the only one who could almost keep up with Ty Lee in gymnastics, even if she never liked this pointed out. Azula was fun to be around.

Except when she insisted they play hide and explode.

Since Azula was the only bender among the three of them, that meant Mai and Ty Lee always had to do the hiding, and Azula always got to do the exploding. And by the time the girls were ten years old, her explosions were deafening. A simple schoolyard game wasn’t supposed to be played with such force, really, but Azula never let things like rules stop her.

More than once, Azula had flushed Ty Lee out of her hiding place with a fireball that set some part of her clothing alight, and then made a pointed comment while Ty Lee frantically smothered the flames about how it was too bad  _ Zuzu _ wasn’t there to put it out for her.

That particular afternoon, Ty Lee had initially hidden herself in what she thought was a fairly good spot, behind the rain barrel in the corner of one of the courtyards. At the very least, if Azula did find her, there would be water on hand to put out whatever fire she started this time. But then one of the servants passing by had surreptitiously whispered to her that Princess Azula was making her way to that very courtyard at that moment.

Realizing both that she was not as well hidden as she had thought she was, and that Azula would likely take her carelessness as an excuse to use even more firepower than normal, Ty Lee panicked. And in her panic, she also broke the rules. Hide and explode was a strictly outdoor game, and not even Azula had ever tried to bring it indoors. But at that moment, Ty Lee didn’t care. She simply didn’t want to be found.

She made a beeline for the nearest door.

Once inside, she panicked again, because she would have no excuse if anyone asked her what she was doing. If she had stopped to think it over, she would have realized that Azula wouldn’t be looking for her indoors, and none of the other servants or courtiers would think her at all out of place in the palace. But she didn’t stop to think, and her instinct was still telling her to hide.

So she ducked into the nearest unlocked room she could find, which turned out to be a bedroom, and then promptly dived under the bed.

_ Brilliant, Ty Lee, _ she scolded herself once she was fully tucked away.  _ Very original hiding spot. _ And then, peering out into the room, she had another jolt of fright - for she saw that she had left the door to the room ajar, and someone else was now pushing it open.

A pair of feet in black and gold boots - too fine to be a servant - walked slowly towards the bed. “Hello?” the owner of the boots called out. “Is someone there?”

It was Zuko.

Ty Lee couldn’t help herself. She squirmed in her hiding spot, pressing both hands over her mouth. But Zuko must have heard her moving, because he knelt down to look under the bed, and the next thing Ty Lee knew she was staring right into his sideways, puzzled face.

“What are you…” Zuko started to ask. Ty Lee hastily shot out one hand and covered his mouth as well, still thinking Azula might have followed her inside. Zuko started and fell onto his backside, now looking quite annoyed rather than merely puzzled. Ty Lee pressed one finger of her other hand to her own lips, pleading with her eyes for him to be silent.

To her relief, when Zuko spoke again, it was in a whisper. “Are you...hiding from Azula?” he guessed.

Ty Lee nodded.

Zuko got up, went back to the door, and shut it. Ty Lee let out a deep sigh of relief, but didn’t feel compelled to come out of her hiding spot just yet. To her surprise, Zuko came back to the side of the bed, stretching out on the floor so he was lying on his stomach opposite her, and resting his chin on his folded arms.

“Sometimes, I hide from her, too,” he admitted, his whisper taking on a conspiratorial tone.

Ty Lee smiled, just a little. “She’s terrifying,” she whispered back - though now that the danger Azula posed was more remote, she said it with as much awe and admiration as actual fear.

Zuko gave a short, humorless laugh. “You're lucky, she’s not  _ your _ sister.”

“You’re lucky you’re not  _ like _ your sister,” Ty Lee shot back, thinking of her own six siblings from whom she was so indistinguishable in the eyes of the world. Zuko would never have that problem, at least.

Unexpectedly, Zuko frowned at this. “ _ She’s _ the lucky one in the family, not me,” he muttered, eyes sliding away to the side. Then he pushed himself up off the floor and got back to his feet.

Ty Lee scooted out from under the bed, just halfway. “Who says that?” she challenged him. Zuko and Azula were both pretty lucky, as far as Ty Lee could tell, being royalty and all. But Zuko was the older sibling, and presumably that put him ahead. Ty Xiang was certainly her parents’ favorite.

Zuko was now scowling at a nondescript spot on the floor. “My father,” he replied in a low voice. Then, before Ty Lee could say anything else, he marched back over to the door. “Hide in here as long as you want. I won’t tell.” And with that he was gone, slamming the door behind him.

Ty Lee poked around a bit in the bedroom - an unused guest room by the look of it - but quickly grew bored. Soon the sound of a loud explosion from outside told her that Mai had been found, and she went back out and rejoined her friends, insisting she had been hiding behind the rain barrel in the courtyard all along.

Azula narrowed her eyes suspiciously, but didn’t outright accuse her of cheating.

“This is a stupid baby game anyway,” the princess declared. And that was the last time they played hide and explode.

* * *

The year after that turned out to be the last school break that Ty Lee spent at the palace.

She was now eleven years old, and she and her friends had only one more year left at the Royal Fire Academy for Girls before they would go on to more specialized education - Azula with private tutors, like Zuko had already done, and Mai and Ty Lee presumably at the junior military officers’ school that it had become the fashion for all the noble families to send their children to, whether they were destined for military careers or not. Ty Xiang had just graduated from it and was soon to start an apprenticeship as a court scribe - another perk of their connection to the royal family - and all of Ty Lee’s other sisters were currently enrolled.

Even if she was still following in all her older sisters’ footsteps, Ty Lee was looking forward to having a little space from Azula at school soon.

Now that the princess had declared them too old for schoolyard games, the three girls spent most of their time either training in their respective martial arts - Mai had taken up knife throwing that year, while Ty Lee continued to progress in hand-to-hand combat - or at the palace spa. Azula was wearing makeup regularly now, and all the girls enjoyed having their hair done.

During that break, Ty Lee tried out a variety of different braided hairstyles, and possibly paid extra attention to see if any of them happened to make Zuko take more notice of her than usual. After all, she was supposed to be angling for the position of future Fire Lady, right?

But Zuko, who was thirteen and, Ty Lee was not ashamed to admit, very handsome, seemed too preoccupied with earning a spot in his father’s war council to pay attention to her, or Mai, or even his own sister.

“Good riddance,” Azula said, when Ty Lee pointed out how aloof from them her brother was acting. “He’ll just make a fool of himself anyway.”

But Ty Lee also knew that Zuko was doing extra firebending lessons with his uncle, which Azula had tried to join in on, only for General Iroh to gently rebuff her. And Azula hated being told no, especially where firebending was concerned. 

“You don’t know that,” Mai said dully, not even looking up from the book she was idly flipping through - which had meticulously drawn diagrams of different weapons on each page. “Maybe General Iroh’s lessons have paid off, and he’ll prove to the Fire Lord what a tactical genius he is.”

It might have been sarcasm - or it might not, with Mai it was never easy to tell, and Ty Lee knew she did that on purpose. Azula, however, was not in one of her rare charitable moods, and glared at the other girl. “Zuko’s no more of a genius than you are,” she replied acidly.

Mai shrugged, and turned another page in her book.

“Well, let’s not argue about it,” Ty Lee said, flipping the long braid she was wearing that day over her shoulder and trying to muster a fraction of Mai’s indifference. “He’s not worth it, right?”

But her stomach tied itself in a guilty knot as she said this, and she had a sinking feeling that Azula could tell she didn’t mean it. Because she  _ did _ hope Mai was right, and that Zuko would get to prove himself to his father. He’d been so sad since his mom had left, and so stuck in his sister’s shadow - one of them should get to break out, at least.

* * *

It was almost the end of the school break and the girls were getting ready to go back for their final year when the Agni Kai took place.

Azula got to witness it, and regaled Ty Lee and Mai with all the gorey details afterwards. “So I guess I was wrong, Mai,” she said as she came to the end of her grisly narrative, inspecting her painted nails. “Even  _ you _ are a genius compared to my dumdum brother.”

Mai frowned, but not at the insult. She was looking at Ty Lee, who had listened, wide-eyed, to the entire story, with one hand pressed over her mouth, too horrified to speak. “Is he…” Mai started to ask, the question that was weighing on both of them, which even she couldn’t finish.

“Oh, he’s not dead,” Azula replied casually, smoothing the edge of her thumbnail along the pads of her fingers. Ty Lee felt a rush of relief at this, but it was quickly stifled when, with a wicked grin of triumph, Azula added, “But Father’s declared him banished.”

“Banished?” Ty Lee echoed, finding her voice at last, though it was still rather faint. Tears that she had valiantly fought back thus far surged forth once more.

“Yes, banished,” Azula repeated, suddenly irritated. She folded her arms and scowled at both Ty Lee and Mai. “As in, made to leave. Kicked out. Sent into exile.”

“We know what banished means,” Mai replied coolly.

“Well you don’t seem very happy about it,” Azula snapped, pointing at Mai accusingly. Ty Lee let out a strangled sob, and Azula turned to her with a look of disgust, another cutting remark surely on the tip of her tongue. But Mai cut her off.

“Why should we care?” Mai asked, arching one eyebrow ever so slightly. “I thought Zuko wasn’t supposed to be worth our consideration.”

Azula let out a growl of frustration. “You two are useless!” she declared vehemently, and then stormed out of the room muttering further slights against them.

Once she was gone, Ty Lee lost her composure completely, sinking to the floor and sobbing into the cushions of a nearby sofa. After a moment, she felt Mai’s hand awkwardly come to rest on her shoulder.

“Do you want to see him?” her friend asked quietly.

It wouldn’t be allowed, surely. Burned, banished princes would not be permitted visitors. But what good was all her boldness for, if she let that stop her now? With a deep breath, she raised her head, looked Mai in the eye - dear, steady Mai, level-headed as ever - and nodded.

They made their way through the palace corridors, Ty Lee holding fast to Mai’s hand and Mai allowing her this comfort. The closer they got to the crown prince’s apartments, the more people there were hurrying to and fro - guards and messengers going back and forth, servants with buckets of water and jars of ointment and stacks of clean bandages heading towards Zuko’s rooms, and other servants with blood-stained linens coming away from them. The two girls slipped quietly through the chaos, unnoticed, until they reached Zuko’s door.

“I’m sorry, young ladies,” one of the guards outside told them. “You have to leave.”

“Princess Azula sent us,” Mai lied smoothly, and Ty Lee nodded in agreement, doing her best to look convincing. “She wants to know how her brother is doing.”

The guard frowned. “Princess Azula was already here,” he informed them sternly, and Ty Lee’s heart sank. “I told her the same thing I’ll tell you - no one gets word of the prince’s condition until the Fire Lord says so.”

Their bluff having been called, the girls had no choice but to leave and come up with another strategy. But as they turned to go, Ty Lee heard the muffled sound of a scream coming from the other side of the door. She winced, and Mai squeezed her hand, and both girls quickened their pace down the corridor.

Later that night, after things had quieted down, they tried again.

They had still seen no sign of Azula, which suited Ty Lee just fine, as it left her and Mai free to steal away to the gardens that Zuko’s rooms overlooked.

“It won’t be an easy climb,” Mai warned in a whisper.

But Ty Lee was determined. “Just give me a boost to that ledge,” she insisted, pointing. “I’ll make it from there.” She had climbed to the top of the tallest tree in her mother’s garden when she was only four years old and run across the rooftops of the school buildings with Azula countless times. Scaling this wall didn’t intimidate her.

Mai sighed, but did as Ty Lee asked, boosting her up on her shoulders so she could reach the first handhold. Ty Lee then pulled herself up onto the narrow ledge, scooted along it until she found another secure foothold, and continued her climb. In a few minutes, she was tumbling over the rail of the balcony off of Zuko’s room. The doors, she was glad to see, had been left open to let in the cool night air. Cautiously, she crept forward and peered into the darkness of the room.

“Zuko?” she whispered. There was no reply, and suddenly Ty Lee realized she had no idea what to say, if he was even listening. “Are you awake?”

There was a faint stirring from within the room, a rustling of cloth that might have been someone shifting in the bed, but it was still too dark for Ty Lee to see anything. “If you are,” she went on, rallying her nerve, “I just wanted to tell you I…”

“Young lady,” a low voice cut her off. General Iroh stepped out of the darkness, his face drawn and tired but his eyes flashing. “You should not be here.”

Ty Lee lifted her chin and met the old general’s eye without blinking. “I wanted to see Zuko.”

“Prince Zuko needs his rest,” General Iroh admonished. Then, with a frown, he added, “And the Fire Lord has forbidden him to have visitors.”

“I know,” Ty Lee replied boldly. But she could see the general’s point about Zuko needing rest. She remembered the muffled cry she had heard earlier, and shivered. “Will he be alright?” she asked in a smaller voice.

Something in General Iroh’s face softened. “I will take good care of him,” he assured her. Then he gave her a sad smile. “And I will tell him, when he wakes, that you asked after him.”

“Thank you,” Ty Lee said with a polite bow, then added in a rush, “Could you also tell him I hope he comes home soon?”

General Iroh gave her a searching look. “I had not realized you and my nephew were so close,” he said, and Ty Lee shrugged, feeling the heat rise in her cheeks. “But I will pass on your message, at the appropriate time.”

Ty Lee thanked him again, and then made her retreat - she could feel General Iroh’s eyes on her the whole time she made her way back over the balcony railing and down the wall, and as she and Mai hastily ran from the garden.

That was the closest she got to seeing Zuko for a long time.

* * *

If her mother leaving had made Azula get meaner, with Zuko now gone as well, the princess became tightly wound and short-tempered.

Ty Lee no longer enjoyed training or sparring with Azula, for Azula made sure she won every match no matter what - and if she ever did slip up and lose, retribution fell swiftly upon her unlucky opponent. There was no incentive to try to beat her, and Ty Lee and Mai probably would have just stopped trying, except that Azula could tell when they weren’t giving a fight their full effort, and would punish them for that as well.

And it wasn’t just in fighting that Azula’s now obsessive perfectionism reared its head. She read voraciously - Fire Nation history, military tactics, law and philosophy, anything that could impress the Fire Lord - and committed everything she read to memory. She was careful about what she ate, never too much or too little, spurning the ginger candies she had loved as a child, and never letting a single crumb of food fall from her plate. Her appearance mattered, too, for her clothes had to be perfectly pressed, her makeup flawlessly applied, and not one single hair out of place.

“Azula,” Mai said to her on the day of their graduation from the Royal Fire Academy for Girls, after the princess had snapped at Ty Lee for some imagined slight. “You really need to relax.”

Azula’s scathing glare turned away from Ty Lee towards Mai, who didn’t react at all. “You would say that,” Azula said darkly. “You’re as lazy as my good-for-nothing uncle.”

“I think graduation day has us all a little stressed out,” Ty Lee piped up helpfully, taking hold of both of her friends’ hands. “But we’ll all have plenty of time to relax when we get to Ember Island, right?”

Ember Island was the favorite vacation spot of the Fire Nation elite. The girls had gone there together one way or another every year since they had become friends - sometimes staying at one family’s beach house, sometimes another’s, and though the Fire Lord himself had not visited the island in some time, he had still let Azula go with Mai and Ty Lee the last few years. This year would be their last hurrah before they went their separate ways, Azula to her private tutors at the palace, Ty Lee to the junior military officers’ school like her sisters, and Mai to a finishing school her mother had insisted on.

But now Azula yanked her hand out of Ty Lee’s grip. “I’m not going to Ember Island,” she declared haughtily, lifting her chin. “I’ll be accompanying Father on his tour of the naval bases instead.”

“Oh,” Ty Lee said in surprise, her heart sinking. She had wanted space from Azula, but not for their friendship to end completely. But if Azula wasn’t spending the vacation with them anymore, and they would be separated when school was in session from now on… “Then this is our last day together,” Ty Lee concluded. “We shouldn’t spend it fighting.”

Azula rolled her eyes. “Don’t be so maudlin,” she scolded.

“Yeah,” Mai agreed, sounding as bored as ever as she too let go of Ty Lee’s hand. “Azula hates being upstaged.”

Ty Lee smothered a giggle, and Azula called them both imbeciles, and that was that.

Ember Island was strange that year, without Azula there. Ty Lee had fun with Mai for the first few days, but then her mother started to complain that she never spent as much time with her family anymore - Mai by herself was not as advantageous a friend as Azula, apparently, and in her mother’s estimation was not sufficient to excuse this prolonged absence from the family sphere. So Ty Lee found herself spending most of her vacation with her sisters and the governess, who was always mixing her up with Ty Dan.

Nobody even teasingly said anything about possible future Fire Ladies anymore.

* * *

When she started at her new school, things only got worse.

In addition to having the same features and coloring, Ty Lee and her sisters were now all more or less the same height, and in the stiff red school uniforms with the same regulation hairstyle, even more indistinguishable to outside eyes than ever. Ty Xiang and Ty Min had already graduated, but that didn’t stop the professors from occasionally calling Ty Lee by their names, in addition to Ty Wei’s, Ty Chu’s, Ty Sao’s, and Ty Dan’s. She was addressed by the correct name no more often than mere chance would expect.

It was ridiculous, Ty Lee thought. Couldn’t anyone see that Ty Wei had sharper eyes than the rest of them, that Ty Sao had a habit of wrinkling her nose, that Ty Dan kept her nails clipped short, and Ty Chu was always smiling? There were any number of idiosyncrasies that set each of them apart, so why was no one able to tell the difference?

“They just don’t look closely enough,” Ty Wei explained matter-of-factly when Ty Lee voiced these complaints to her. “You know that’s how it’s always been.”

Ty Wei was right, and neither she nor her other sisters seemed to think there was anything they could do about it. But as her first year at the new school wore on, Ty Lee began to question this fatalistic outlook. The life of a military officer held little appeal for her, and the life of a court scribe that Ty Xiang had settled into seemed no better. 

Ty Min, the dreamer, was currently living out her own great romance with the eldest son of an important noble house, to whom her betrothal was considered imminent. The thought of that being her future too only filled Ty Lee with an inexplicable melancholy.

So if she didn’t want any of the things that life had to offer her in her current position, why should she suffer through the indignity of this military school life? If she wanted to break out of her sisters’ shadow, to forge her own path rather than following in their footsteps again and again, why not start now?

At the end of her first year, when she was thirteen years old, Ty Lee wrote letters to Mai and Azula explaining her decision, and a more circumspect one to her mother, assuring her that her youngest daughter would be just fine on her own. And then she ran away.


End file.
